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Among Provence winemakers, Henning and Sylvain Hoesch are close to being heretics. The father and son have made wine for a combined 40 years at Domaine Richeaume on the west flanks of Montagne Sainte-Victoire, just east of Aix-en-Provence, but they've shunned the local rosé tradition in favor of exciting, full-bodied reds.

Has anyone ever put together an eight-course menu in which every dish involves coffee—and mostly without using the beans themselves or the drink made from them? Frank Kramm, the chef at Daylight Mind, my cousin's ambitious coffee bar, café, restaurant and coffee school in Kona, Hawaii, creatively pureed the coffee fruit itself to flavor a butter, burned chaff from roasting the beans to smoke roast duck, and sprinkled coffee-flavored salt over slices of raw fish. We paired the dishes with Roederer Champagne Cristal, Château Margaux, Beaux Fréres Pinot Noir and a Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise.

Last week, Adam and Dianna Lee signed a deal selling Siduri, which produces 20,000 cases of California Pinot Noir a year, and Novy, a 5,000-case brand, to Jackson Family Wines—which owns more than two dozen wineries. Neither side will talk price, but based on other recent deals, we're talking tens of millions of dollars.

Some days, it feels like there are no small wineries left in California. Of course that's not true, but I'm often editing news of a larger wine company swallowing a smaller one.

Wine Spectator senior editor Bruce Sanderson is in France, visiting domaines and tasting the recent vintages of red and white Burgundies. WineSpectator.com members can read his scores and tasting notes. Today he continues with more scores and tasting notes from Domaine Leroy.

My cousin, coffee guru Shawn Steiman, agreed to try three different wines with three distinct kinds of coffee with me, to compare how both beverages might reflect where they were grown and how they were made. I chose a fresh white wine, a lighter style of red and a full-bodied red, and Shawn used three different coffees in three styles: drip, full-immersion and espresso.

When Jake and Scot Bilbro took over Limerick Lane winery and vineyard in 2011, it seemed an ideal match. The estate has a rich history of producing outstanding Zinfandel, and the brothers Bilbro grew up in the Sonoma County wine business with their dad, Chris Bilbro, at Marietta Cellars.

The Washington winery that snagged the winemaker from Bryant Family, a California cult favorite, has added to the intrigue by bringing Helen Keplinger into the fold, too. Keplinger was Bryant's winemaker for two years before going off on her own in 2012 to focus on Grenache.

Now she's signed on to consult with the innovative Force Majeure, where her former assistant at Bryant, Todd Alexander, was named winemaker last year. Alexander worked at PlumpJack and followed Keplinger as Bryant's ace in the cellar, a position Philippe Melka, Helen Turley and Mark Aubert held previously. Starry names, all.

Wine Spectator contributing editor Robert Camuto talks to Luc de Conti about his unorthodox decision to pull up his red-wine grapevines in southwest France and replace them with Sauvignon Blanc and other white varieties.

The biggest divide in the wine world isn't between high alcohol and low alcohol, it's between fruit and savory. Many people shy away from the wet earth, cedar, meat and herb qualities preferred by those who go for savory styles. Most people like fruit. The contrasting 2011 and 2012 Oregon Pinot Noir vintages offer a perfect illustration.

This past week, the words "Je suis Charlie" ("I am Charlie") have traveled the world in sympathy with the victims of the deadly jihadist terrorist attack on the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo. Among the slain were five of France's most celebrated cartoonists. Three of them were also among the country's most outrageous wine label designers.

"They were my friends," explains Bordeaux winemaker Gérard Descrambe, 65. For more than 40 years, Descrambes commissioned Charlie Hebdo cartoonists and others to make eye-catching labels that varied from drunken to suggestive to sexually explicit humor.

The restaurant that jump-started fine dining in Napa Valley closed Jan. 1, to be converted into an elaborate tasting room. Étoile had too much competition from the long list of great restaurants that stretch from Napa to Calistoga these days, and its operators reportedy could not reach an agreement on lease arrangements.

Kirkland Signature may be a generic house brand, but it's from one of the biggest wine retailers on the planet. Now with an all-star lineup of partners, Costco may just be bottling your favorite vineyard in that $20 Napa Cab.